AMMAN — Amazon on Tuesday announced the top three winners of
Amazon Teckathon, a three-day virtual hackathon event for university students
in Jordan, which took place between July 26 and 28, the Jordan News Agency,
Petra, reported.
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The company said in
a statement that the second edition of the hackathon saw the participation of
students from 20 universities; the aim was to develop creative software
solutions with real-life impact to improve people’s everyday lives.
The Amazon Teckathon’s
2022 edition saw 114 projects submitted; university students were encouraged to
develop, design, code, and build innovative software solutions, which each team
presented to a judging panel of Amazon experts in five-minute video
presentations. The judging panel consisted of senior Amazon technical leaders
who evaluated each submission based on software implementation, project idea,
and project presentation.
Minister of Digital
Economy and Entrepreneurship Ahmed Hanandeh has actively supported initiatives
aimed at encouraging and inspiring Jordan’s youth to improve themselves in the
ever-growing field of technology and programming. Hanandeh said he was pleased
to see Amazon continue to nurture talent across Jordan by bringing back the
virtual hackathon event for its second year, reinforcing the importance of
sharing knowledge and experience required to create the tech leaders of
tomorrow.
Ammar Shanir,
first-place winner from Jordan University of Science and Technology, received a
scholarship prize amounting to $10,000 from Amazon for “BiLy”, an innovative
application that converts speech to text in real time while distinguishing
between various languages, including Arabic and English, to provide the most
appropriate word.
“As a university
student, I was extremely privileged to be given the opportunity to take part in
the Amazon Teckathon this year. The hackathon was all-encompassing as it put my
team’s creative thinking, programming skills, and time management to the test.
I am so grateful for the entire experience as it has honed my technical and
programming skills. This was an unforgettable experience and I am honored that
the expert panel recognized my work,” Shanir said.
Country Manager
Amazon in Jordan Mahmoud Obeidat said: “This year, we were once again very
impressed with the level of innovation, skill, and dedication brought to the
Amazon Teckathon event by participating students. Our second edition of the
event truly encouraged customer-centric thinking … and it has been inspiring to
see students embrace the Amazon culture while delivering an exceptional level
of competition during the hackathon.”
“Congratulations to
the Amazon Teckathon 2022 winners and all participants for their effort and
ingenious software solutions. Several of our technology teams for the region
are based out of Amman, a commitment to our recognition of the very strong
programming landscape and brilliant talents present in Jordan, which we look
forward to continue nurturing,” he added.
Abdullrahman Wasfi
and Layan AlHimsi, the participants that came in second place with their “Nedz”
software solution, as well as Shahed Nabeel and Mohammad Alkhateeb who were
awarded third place in this year’s Amazon Teckathon for their work on the
“Detector” project, respectively took home scholarships of $7,000 and $5,000
from Amazon, which will contribute to their education, the statement added.
Aiming to help
improve communication skills between autistic individuals and their caregivers,
Abdullrahman Wasfi and Layan AlHimsi from Princess Sumaya University for
Technology created “Nedz”, an application that uses artificial intelligence and
machine learning to better understand the needs of autistic individuals.
Third place
recipients Nabeel and Alkhateeb, from Yarmouk University, created “Detector”, an
application that uses AI to detect skin cancer, providing a detailed evaluation
in terms of type and accuracy by simply taking a picture.
Amazon also
recognized winners in one special category, “Best Customer Centric Solution for
MENA Customers”, which was awarded to Abdel Rahman Al Sabbagh and Faris
AlHumsi, who won their own Kindle devices for the creation of “Saiph”.
This AI searching
system thoroughly examines files and documents for quality to provide the best
possible content. It takes multiple factors into consideration, such as
identifying relevant synonyms, repetition, misspellings and dialect, sharing
results efficiently to meet the desired criteria.
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